Background music for your museum, without Buma and Sena
RadioMatic lets you decide per room what plays and where it stays quiet, with your own announcements in the hall and the café. Because the music is made entirely by AI, no payments are due to Buma/Stemra and Sena.
With RadioMatic from € 29.99 per location per month, without Buma and Sena. News and your own announcements with Professional. See all plans
What do you pay now for music in your museum?
Three questions, and you see what you now spend on Buma/Stemra, Sena and your music service.
How big is your business?
What else you get
Silence where it matters In a museum it depends on the room whether music can play. A display with its own audio, a film or a sound installation by the artist does not take music over the top of it. There silence is the only good setting. In the entrance hall, the cloakroom, the museum café and the shop it is different. With RadioMatic you set every zone separately, including when you want nothing to play there. You switch it on and off yourself, without calling anyone.
Tours and closing time announced Where music does fit, the DJ moments make your own announcements. For instance that the guided tour starts at three, that the exhibition runs until the end of November, that the museum closes in half an hour or that the permanent display on the second floor is shut this week. You type it into the dashboard and you hear it on the next round, in the voice you pick. You need no studio and no recorded tape for that.
No adverts beside your sponsors Third-party advertising never comes in between. In a museum with sponsors, funds and partners that carries more weight than in a shop. The music is generated and does not come from a fixed list. Your room staff, who stand there for eight hours, keep hearing new music in the same style. A changing exhibition can get its own mood, without anyone having to put a new list together.
Which tariff does a museum fall under at Buma and Sena?
Buma charges by floor area Buma/Stemra has its own page about music in museums. For background music it points to the tariff for mechanical background music, based on the floor area where the music can be heard. Within that tariff category B is a closed list, with swimming and sauna baths and waiting areas without a hospitality facility among others.
A museum lands in category A A museum is not on it. So you end up in category A, the residual category for everything that is not on that list. You land there because museums are not named anywhere, and category A is the dearer of the two.
Sena gives no explanation At Sena it runs through the table Overige ruimtes (other spaces), and an honest note belongs with that. It is the only table in the overview without an explanation, so nowhere does it say what falls under it. It is the general table left over when none of the others fit. We are not writing here that Sena puts museums under it, because that is not what it says.
Floor areas added together If you want certainty about your own situation, ask in writing and keep the answer. On the Buma side, the floor areas of your rooms are added together into one bracket, as long as the same music from the same source plays everywhere. If the museum café puts something else on, you pay per space.
No fees for AI-made music With RadioMatic no payment is due to Buma/Stemra or Sena, because the music is made entirely with AI. Buma/Stemra itself says that music made entirely by AI, without a creative contribution from a person, does not qualify for copyright or payment. The same applies to Sena.
What the law and the court say Sena can only collect for a recording that has been commercially released, and on that ground Sena lost in court in 2025. The full reasoning is in our legal memorandum.
| Buma/Stemra | € 1,707 |
|---|---|
| Sena, including the RAAP-PPI surcharge | € 1,011 |
| Together per year | € 2,719 |
Sources: Buma/Stemra, music in museums, Buma/Stemra, mechanical background music, binding tariff text BUM.129.26/01, article 3, article 7 and article 8, Buma/Stemra, tariff sheet mechanical background music 2026, and Sena, 2026 tariff overview, page 15, table Overige ruimtes. Article 7 of BUM.129 is a closed list for category B, and the tariff sheet describes category A as all other operations with mechanical background music. The category A scale runs by floor area up to 100, 200, 400, 800 and 1,600 m², and above that per 1,600 m² more, and the Sena scale runs along the same lines. Article 8 provides that floor areas are added together where the same music from the same source plays in different spaces, and that you pay for each space separately where different music plays. Overige ruimtes is the only table in the Sena overview without an explanation. Amounts per year and base tariff, Buma/Stemra excluding VAT, Sena exempt from VAT and here including the RAAP-PPI surcharge of 26.6%. Details of other providers from their own sites, consulted on 23 September 2026. Also used ECLI:NL:RBGEL:2025:6175.
Which rooms get music, and which stay quiet?
Quiet rooms, music in the hall Music in a museum competes with what there is to see and to read. Think of a room with long wall texts, an audio tour or work people stand still in front of. Music with words you can make out pulls attention away from what the visitor came for. The best setting there is often no music. In a walkway, a stairwell or a hall it works the other way round. There music fills the hollow silence and dampens the footsteps and conversations bouncing off the ceiling.
Café and shop take more The museum café and the shop have a rhythm of their own and take more. A café on a rainy Sunday afternoon is a different space from the same café at half past ten on a Tuesday, and the music can move with the part of the day. In the shop it can be a bit more present, because people are walking around there and not sitting.
A mood for each exhibition A museum also has rooms that change. An exhibition hanging for three months can get its own mood that fits the subject. Afterwards you set it back. With RadioMatic you set that per zone from one dashboard. The style stays, and the music is new every day.
Zones in one dashboard, on the installation already there
Nothing to replace You do not have to replace anything. Many museums already have an amplifier with ceiling speakers or a zone system for evacuation announcements, and the stream goes into that system through the line-in. Sonos, a Chromecast or a browser on a PC by the desk work just as well. We do not supply speakers and you do not need them from us either.
Each room on or off Per room or per zone you set what plays, how loud, and whether anything is said. Rooms that have to stay quiet you switch off, and they stay off. With more locations or an annexe everything sits under one account, with its own mood and announcements per location. You hear back within one working day, and after that your station is live in under ten minutes.
What you can choose from today
No supplier for museums Look for music for your museum and you will find little. Of the suppliers we checked, not one has a page for museums or exhibition spaces. Synerplay, Backsound and Mood Media name hospitality, retail, hotels, fitness and healthcare. None of the three mentions the museum.
Two extra bills So you end up with a general business subscription playing music by human creators. That means two extra bills, from Buma/Stemra and from Sena. Synerplay says itself that you arrange those licences directly with the rights organisations. What that costs is set out above.
With RadioMatic the room with the film or the audio tour stays quiet, while music plays in the hall, the café and the shop. In the hall visitors hear in between that the guided tour starts at three or that the museum closes in half an hour. An exhibition hanging for three months gets its own mood, which you set back afterwards.
Why RadioMatic is something other than a playlist or the radio
A business owner who wants music on the premises usually picks from three things. A playlist from a streaming service, an ordinary radio station, or a royalty-free music package. This is where they differ.
| Playlist | Ordinary radio | Royalty-free | RadioMatic | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New music | Fixed list | Yes, but not your choice | Limited catalogue | New every day |
| Music that is yours alone | No | No | No | Yes, your own hits |
| Fits the time of day | Switch it yourself | No | Switch it yourself | Automatic |
| Names your business | No | No | No | Yes |
| Your own offers | No | Only if you buy advertising | No | Yes, with Professional, no studio |
| Local news and weather | No | Yes, the station’s | No | Yes, with Professional, your town |
| Other people’s adverts | No | Yes | No | No |
| Several locations | Set up per location | No | Set up per location | Yes, from one place, each with its own mood |
| Buma/Stemra and Sena | Payable | Payable | See the terms | Not payable |
Frequently asked questions about music in your museum
Other kinds of business
- Background music for your photo studio, without Buma and SenaPhoto studios and recording spaces
- Background music in the shopping centre, without Buma and SenaShopping centres and arcades
- Background music for your hotel, without Buma and SenaBackground music for hotels
- Background music for your bookshop, without Buma and SenaBackground music for bookshops
Background music for business. What is allowed, what does it cost and what are your options?
Ready to hear it for yourself?
Try RadioMatic free for 14 days. Your own station for your business, without Buma/Stemra and Sena, and cancel monthly if you pay monthly.
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